


焦がれて怖くなる [I yearn for you so much that I'm getting scared]

by sunburst_city



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Alternate Universe - Magical Realism, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Angst with a Happy Ending, Gratuitous use of flower meanings, Light Angst, M/M, Magical Tattoos, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, Tattoos, a different take on the soulmate tattoo AU, hanakotoba
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-01
Updated: 2019-09-01
Packaged: 2020-10-04 20:00:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,816
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20476688
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sunburst_city/pseuds/sunburst_city
Summary: Tooru's body is littered with different flowers. Hajime's is, too. Not as many as Tooru has, but enough for Tooru to rest assured that Hajime will never realize that the cluster of red and yellow camellias above his heart are from Tooru.(AU where flowers bloom on your body like tattoos when someone experiences particularly strong or long-lasting emotions for you.)





	焦がれて怖くなる [I yearn for you so much that I'm getting scared]

**Author's Note:**

> Title is a line from the Japanese version of BTS's Butterfly

Tooru's body is littered with flowers.

It comes with the territory of being a semi-famous personality around the neighborhood. Flowers of different kinds and sizes cover his skin moreso than others'. There are some flowers he's come to love more than others, though. He particularly likes the white rose wrapped around his right pinky (something that bloomed when he brought Takeru to his first volleyball lesson at Lil Tykes), the carnations on his cheek (where his mother kisses him every morning before he leaves for school), and the cluster of yellow chrysanthemums and daffodils on his palms (they've been slowly appearing since he joined Aoba Johsai's volleyball team, and bloomed completely when he became captain).

He's researched a great deal about _hanakotoba_ ever since he first learned what the flowers sprouting meant. Because of this, he can't help but feel fondness for the small violets and pansies dotting his skin that sing of his fans' adoration, and blush every time a cactus speaks of someone's lust for him. If there's a meaning behind any flower, Tooru most likely knows it.

Which is why his heart stutters painfully when he sees the bright red camellias on Iwaizumi's chest for the first time.

Matsukawa is the one who first notices it in the middle of their second year, right as they're changing in the locker room after training. He brings it to everyone else's attention with a low whistle.

"Another one, Iwaizumi? Pretty soon you'll have as many flowers as Oikawa at this rate."

Everyone looks up with varying degrees of interest. Some of their upperclassmen even begin teasing. It isn't a secret that Iwaizumi is pretty popular and gets his fair share of admirers. While he might not have as many flowers as Tooru does (and, really, Tooru sometimes has enough flowers to rival a small-time idol), it is still clear that Iwaizumi is well-loved and respected. 

Tooru is about to playfully say something indignant, but when he spots the camellias on Iwaizumi's chest—more vibrant than any tattoo he's seen on anyone—his heart lurches. Countless hours spent pouring over forums and books has told him that camellias were very rare. For Iwaizumi to have two of them, and in such vivid colors...

Who? Who was it that loved Iwaizumi that fiercely?

Iwaizumi frowns down at the flower. "Huh. Could've sworn there were different flowers there." 

"I don't think I've ever seen those flowers before. Say, Oikawa, what do they mean?" Matsukawa brings him into the conversation. 

Tooru can lie and say he didn't know, but at least half the room would call him out on it. They all know his near-obsession with the flowers, so pleading dumb would be suspicious from the start. He can try to give a different meaning, but someone might find out one way or another if Iwaizumi doesn't immediately latch onto his tells and call out his bluff. Either option would only lead to a series of questions Tooru isn't ready to answer, not when he'd only recently come to terms with his not-so-platonic feelings for Iwaizumi.

Taking extra care not to let his voice get caught in his throat, he says, "Red camellias, representative of someone deep in love."

That sends the boys into a holler, pounding on lockers and wolf-whistling. Iwaizumi flushes red from his cheeks down to his neck. 

As Tooru stares at the camellias, a myriad of emotions twist in his chest. Just then, another camellia blooms on Iwaizumi's skin, rising to the surface in rich amber hues. The team squawks in amazement. Meanwhile, Tooru's stomach bottoms out and his head swims in a swirl of relief, embarrassment, and horror.

"Holy crap, that's so cool."

"I've never seen a flower bloom live."

"It's yellow this time." 

Yellow, for longing. Blooming right as Tooru was hoping he wouldn't lose Iwaizumi to the person behind the camellias, wishing so hard for Iwaizumi to be his and only his, nobody else's.

Oh, shit. 

•

The thing about the flowers is that they're not permanent. They only dwell on one's skin while the admirer's feelings remain the same. Tooru has had some flowers gradually grow and even bloom into a different species with time, while some others wither, sinking back into the surface of his skin until it looked like there were never flowers there in the first place. 

So when Iwaizumi says there was a different flower on his chest before the camellias, Tooru believes him. Tooru has only recently realized his feelings for Iwaizumi run deeper than brotherhood, so it makes sense that the camellias have never bloomed until now. While the flowers reflect a person's emotions regardless of whether they're aware of those emotions or not, he's read that knowing how one feels about someone can make the flowers more vivid or even change.

(Still, Tooru wasn't prepared to have his emotions splayed out like that. He's still reeling and kind of incredibly embarrassed at the apparent strength of his feelings for Iwaizumi.) 

He can't remember what the flowers on Iwaizumi's chest used to be, mostly because he didn't keep track of it. He's always assumed that his flowers on Iwaizumi were the ones on the side of Iwaizumi's right shin, where he'd accidentally kicked his best friend when they first met as kids. Now that he knows otherwise, he's unsure of how to move forward. 

One thing is for sure, Iwaizumi can't know that the camellias are from Tooru. At least, not yet. Tooru is still trying to figure things out on his end, especially now that the camellias have shown him that his thing for Iwaizumi is more than a little crush. 

He'll tell Iwaizumi when he's ready. 

•

Tooru's knee gives out shortly after. 

He's wrecked it to the point where he needs surgery on it, which will ban him from intensive training for months after that. He's essentially down for the count for the rest of his second year and even a few weeks of his third. His captaincy is on the line; but if he doesn't get the surgery, he risks never playing volleyball or any other sport competitively ever again. So, with a heavy heart, Tooru bows out of the rest of the season and undergoes the surgery. 

Physical therapy is hard, walking is harder, and watching his teammates train and play while he can't is heartbreaking. 

Tooru falls into a slump. Without volleyball to focus on, he withdraws into himself, gets lost in his own head, trapped with demons in the form of his own thoughts. His demons are loud and relentless, seizing him in a hold much stronger than when he'd been about to hit Kageyama a few years back. 

It's Iwaizumi who pulls him out of it. He gives him the idea that just because he can't play on court, does not mean he can't _play_. 

"Use your eyes," he says. "You're the most observant guy on the team. Put it to good use."

So, during his recovery, Tooru hones his game sense even more. He observes his teammates and the team as a whole, looking into their strengths and weaknessesand how to make the most out of each player in a game. He takes note of Watari's form as the first-year pulls off amazing receives despite being a setter, and imagines having a team with a capable libero who also serves as a backup setter on the court. 

During matches, he would study their opponent: How they play as a unit, which players to watch out for, where the chinks in their armor are. The first time Tooru speaks up during a time out, telling Iwa-chan to aim a spike directly at the libero with all his power, the coach is surprised and incredibly confused, but all Iwaizumi does is nod. When Iwaizumi does as Tooru says during the next play, the libero is unable to receive the ball, as Tooru expected. The libero has quick reflexes and knows where the ball will hit, but he doesn't have the skill to control the ball and redirect it in the way he wants; it's easier to overpower him with a direct hit than to try to outwit him with a spike that doesn't have a spiker's full strength. 

The team is awed. From then on, Coach Irihata lets Tooru call more and more plays. The third years are initially reluctant to follow, but his fellow second years and some of the kouhai take to his plays without hesitation. Every now and then, Hanamaki or Matsukawa or Iwaizumi would pipe in with observations they get while playing, like how a middle blocker likes spinning the ball when he pushes it down or how a setter's eyes shift to the right when he's about to perform a dump shot, input that Tooru can't easily gleam from the sidelines.

Here, Tooru feels less useless. His plays get them through some pretty tough spots during the Spring High tournament. Unfortunately, they weren't enough to get them past Shiratorizawa. 

Somehow, even though he was benched for a good portion of the season, Tooru still gets elected as volleyball captain. 

(Iwaizumi just looks at him when he says this and retorts: "Who else could it possibly be?") 

The next time Tooru is with Iwaizumi in the locker room, he is caught off guard, but isn't all that surprised to find that the yellow camellia on Iwaizumi's chest has bled into bright red. 

• 

The peonies start growing on Iwaizumi's back sometime in the beginning of third year. Iwaizumi has shown to be every bit the vice captain Tooru knew he would be. He looks out for the team in a way Tooru can't. Tooru pulls them forward, sure, but it's Iwaizumi who's pushing and supporting them from behind.

Honestly, he wouldn't be surprised if each of the team members have each claimed some spot of Iwaizumi's skin for themselves by now, but when he first spots the peonies on Iwaizumi's broad back, just above his shoulder blades, he immediately knows they're from the team as a whole.

In the same way that team has marked Tooru's palm with yellow chrysanthemums for his title as the imperious Grand King, the peonies show that Iwaizumi is Seijou's brave lionheart. Tooru couldn't be any prouder of him whenever he compliments Kindaichi and Kunimi and gives them tips, or when he easily gains the respect of Kyoutani, or when he playfully roughhouses with Hanamaki and Matsukawa. 

Another yellow camellia blooms on Iwaizumi's chest. 

•

They get into a fight near the end of their third year.

Spring High has come and gone, and the last of their high school days are spent viciously trying to salvage as much of their grades as they can.

There isn't any one single reason for their fight. It's more of a build-up of multiple things: Iwaizumi choosing to retire immediately after Spring High and not showing up to volleyball practice to help the underclassmen, Tooru being busy with the club and with university interviews, Iwaizumi excusing himself when Tooru wants to hang out. Everything tips over when Tooru finds out that Iwaizumi has already confirmed his enrollment into a university without telling Tooru. 

A university in _Kyoto_, when they'd agreed to both go to Tokyo. 

The funniest thing about it all is: that isn't even the punchline. 

"You're_ quitting volleyball!?"_

Iwaizumi flinches. Meanwhile, Tooru is having a difficult time digesting what his best friend just said; he can't imagine not playing in a team, not after so many years of it, not when they haven't reached the top yet. 

"I'm not _quitting_ volleyball; I'm just not going to try out for the team. I don't think I'll have time for it, anyway. The program looks intense."

Of course it's intense. Iwaizumi is getting a medical degree. Tooru's brother is a doctor, and he's seen how long and hard the elder has struggled to get it. Still... 

"And why Kyoto?"

"They have a good program—"

"And so does our first choice in Tokyo!"

Tooru double-checked that, made sure that all the prospective universities in their list offered both of their preferred majors. He even listed the universities in order to how renowned they were in regards to those majors. Now, though, it seems like he shouldn't have bothered. 

"I don't understand where this sudden need to study in Kyoto came from, Iwa-cha—"

"I'm tired of living in your shadow, Oikawa!"

Tooru freezes.

In his shadow? When has he ever made Iwaizumi feel like that? He practically fucking worshipsthe ground his best friend scuffs the back hems of his pants on. 

Iwaizumi looks like he kind of regrets saying what he did, but Tooru has the tendency to spit acid as a last line of defense when he's vulnerable. (And _fuck_, Tooru is way past vulnerable and is just plain hurt, now.) It's worse when compounded with his knack for finding percieved weaknesses; Tooru knows where to aim for it to hurt, and he definitely doesn't pull punches. 

"Maybe you wouldn't feel that way if you were better."

Their argument ends with Iwaizumi storming out of the Oikawa household. When the rest of the Iwaizumi family comes over for their weekly dinner that evening, Auntie Iwaizumi tells them "Hajime isn't feeling well," but both families can tell something went down that afternoon. Tooru remains subdued throughout the dinner, and his false smile and charming act is so weak that everyone could tell he is faking it. 

That night, orange lilies line the inside of his left wrist, right where a patch of zinnia used to reside, and Tooru desperately hopes he hasn't just exchanged Iwa-chan's loyalty for hatred.

•

The radio silence lasts a week. They don't walk together to and from school, and they don't speak to each other, not even when Iwaizumi surprisingly shows up during practice. When it's time for their families' weekly dinner, this time at Iwaizumi's house, Tooru makes some bullshit excuse about last-minute follow-up interviews with some universities and begs out. 

Everyone who knows them—the coaches, the team, their classmates, their parents, even—watch in confusion and worry, unsure of how to handle a situation in which Iwaizumi and Tooru pretended the other doesn't exist.

Iwaizumi has never felt so far away from Tooru. 

This isn't how he imagined the end of the school year to go. They only have precious little time, especially now that Iwaizumi has set his mind on going to a university six hours away instead of fifteen minutes. 

Tooru knows he was out of line. His anger and even his hurt subsided a few days after their fight. He knows that both of them said things they didn't really mean. 

He just wants things between them to be back to normal. He wants Iwaizumi and him to go to the same university, or at least be in the same town as each other. He wants Iwa-chan to forgive him for what he said, wants Iwa-chan to not hate him. 

Tooru wants a lot of things. 

(If Tooru looked at Iwaizumi's direction, he would notice the small primroses at the edges of the camellias on Iwaizumi's chest, almost like they were choking the reds and yellows with their desperation.)

As for what _Iwaizumi_ said...

Tooru would be damned if he becomes the one who holds Iwaizumi back, not after everything Iwa-chan has done for him. He might not have been as obvious about it as other people, but Tooru has always put his best friend first above all else. It's the least he can do for the kid who stood by his side for almost his entire life, playing and growing with him until they're barely-adults expected to take on the world. And if Iwaizumi really wants this, then who is Tooru to get in the way? 

Not all childhood friendships survive. Maybe (and the thought alone already makes Tooru want to cry) it's time to let his oldest friend go. 

•

Tooru makes up with Iwaizumi after a few days. 

It's stunted and awkward, but undoubtedly sincere, as all of his apologies to Iwaizumi have been through the years. 

Iwaizumi understands; he always does. He apologizes as well.

"I didn't mean it that way. I just... I need to figure out what I want. As cheesy as it sounds, I want to know who I am. Outside of volleyball."

That is what he says, but all Tooru can hear is the glaring _Without you,_ tacked wordlessly at the end.

"I just want you to be happy, Iwa-chan." Tooru replies. He suspects that the only reason he got away with the fake smile then is because his words were completely sincere. 

More yellow camellias bloom. A few days later, the primroses fade, and are replaced by _kuroyuri_.

Surprisingly, it's Kunimi—who has never really made a big deal of the flowers—who reacts sharply. 

"Ah— did you reject anyone recently, senpai?" Kunimi's tone is careful, but there is a distinct bite underlying his words. 

Iwaizumi looks confused. "No, why?" 

Kunimi points to his chest. "Then, how long have those flowers been there?" 

Iwaizumi lookes down. "A few days, I think? Kunimi, what is going on?" 

"Those are _kuroyuri_."

Tooru wonders how Kunimi found out about the _kuroyuri_. He himself only found out about it yesterday, when he saw the new additions to his patch on Iwaizumi's chest and looked for a name to put to the squeezing in his own chest whenever he so much as glances Iwaizumi's way.

Iwaizumi continues to look perplexed. "And?"

Out of the corner of his eye, Tooru sees Iwaizumi turn to look at him questioningly. Tooru figures Iwaizumi thinks that, surely, if something were odd about any flower that blooms on him, Tooru wouldn't have missed the opportunity to tease him about it. Tooru carefully doesn't meet his eye. 

Kunimi can't seem to make eye contact with Iwaizumi as he explains, either. "They stand for cursed love. They replaced my older sister's roses on her husband after she found out he has another family with a mistress." 

Dead silence from the team as everyone stops rummaging through their lockers. 

"I thought the pain of one-sided love was shown through yellow tulips?" Kindaichi ventures, and if there was any shred of doubt in Tooru's mind beforehand about whom the yellow tulips on Iwaizumi's bicep are from, there is none of it now. 

"_Kuroyuri_ are worse. It's the acknowledgment of an unrequited love, and the hopeless resignation to live with it. It's love that irreparably hurts the giver, but at the same time, they can't help but keep loving that person. It's almost like saying 'you have all of me but i don't have any of you.'" 

Iwaizumi—ever so kind—looks concerned, looks _guilty_ even thought he doesn't even know who is behind the flowers, and Tooru can't even bring himself to feel vindicated or guilty or awed. All he can feel is a strange mixture of longing and loss, like trying to grip air with his bare hands. 

He just desperately hopes nobody takes note of the timing of his fight with Iwaizumi and the emergence of the _kuroyuri_, and pieces them together into the ugly, complete picture that it really is. 

After that, time seems to go on even faster. They graduate without further incident, and go their separate ways. Tooru has a scholarship to play volleyball for Chuo, and Iwaizumi goes to Kyoto. 

•

Tokyo is big and bustling and filled to the brim with all kinds of personalities. It's somewhat intimidating to face alone, but no matter the place, volleyball remains Tooru's lifeblood. Days are filled with hours of practice and learning the crowded streets around his apartment and his university.

Tooru finds comfort in Bokuto Koutarou and, in an ironic twist of events, Ushijima Wakatoshi, who are both now his teammates. 

Bokuto is a boundless, sporadic ball of uncontained energy and spiraling moods. People would think that Tooru would hate him because he's so uncontrollable, but Tooru feels a sense of camaraderie with him. He's fond of Bokuto, who's smarter and more observant than people give him credit for. Together, they navigate unreasonable 7AM lectures and share their ambitions about climbing their way to the top. 

Ushiwaka, as it turns out, really is just a volleyball idiot like Tobio and Chibi-chan. Tooru still kind of hates him (Ushiwaka, after all, never did take back the "barren soil" comment he made about Seijou last year), and Tooru will take every chance he can to roast the Shiratorizawa alumnus, but he's formed a grudging alliance with him. They work like a dream, as Ushiwaka predicted in high school. Tooru pointedly does not acknowledge this. 

Tooru throws himself into volleyball with even more vigor than he did in high school. Tokyo-based university teams are on a separate level from high school teams, and he needs to put in as much practice as he can to even stay on the same level as these athletes.

Contact with Iwaizumi is sparse. They're both busy, after all. On top of that, Iwaizumi also has to get used to the rigor of being a pre-med major. Daily text messages become weekly video calls, which then become biweekly ones, which go back to messages, this time sent at odd hours and without prompts for replies. Sometimes, Tooru will hear about Iwaizumi through Bokuto, whose good friend Kuroo attends the same university as Iwaizumi. 

It's simultaneously good and bad, Tooru thinks. He misses Iwa-chan terribly, but maybe the distance will be good for his grieving heart. 

Breaks pass. Tooru goes home whenever he can, but he never sees Iwaizumi when he does. 

He tells himself it's better this way.

•

Tokyo is big and bustling and filled to the brim with all kinds of personalities, even late at night when Tooru feels loneliness settle in like an old friend in his otherwise empty apartment. 

•

In his second year, they have an open practice match at Iwaizumi's university.

Tooru finally meets Kuroo on that day. They get to speak a little before the match when Bokuto all but drags Tooru to Kuroo the moment they're out of the bus.

The Nekoma alumnus is as devious as Tooru assumed he would be. Devious, and perceptive. Tooru hasn't decided if they'll be thick as thieves or if he'll end up wanting to painfully rip out that messy mop of bedhead from the roots. 

The first game involves the first-string players, so Tooru doesn't get to play much except when he's being subbed in as a pinch server. 

The second-string players—including Tooru, Bokuto, Ushiwaka, and Kuroo on the other team—get to play in the second game. Four points in, and Tooru already knows that Kuroo's devious nature translates into something damn near cunning on court. 

It's dumb, really. How it happens. In the second set, Tooru mistimes an experimental jump serve and he lands heavily, with his knee taking his full weight on impact to the floor.

Pain shoots up from his knee, crawling up his spine like lightning. A screech gets strangled in his throat as his arms flail about, torn between clutching his knee and knowing that any contact right now would cause even more pain. 

"Oikawa!" And suddenly, Iwaizumi is there, pushing through the circle of Tooru's teammates surrounding him. Tooru didn't even realize he was watching the practice match. 

"Oikawa, come on." Iwaizumi says. "Let's get you checked out."

Through his shock and confusion, Tooru can vaguely hear his coaches protest and Ushiwaka placate them, explaining Iwaizumi's relation to Tooru. Iwaizumi all but hauls him off of the court, taking care not to jostle his knee. 

He's brought to the clinic in the gym. The nurse on duty is busy tending to another patient (one of Kuroo's teammates who'd sprained his fingers just a few minutes prior). Iwaizumi must know the nurse somehow, because she entrusts him to take care of Tooru while she finishes up with the other patient.

Iwaizumi points at his knee brace. "Off. Now."

Tooru doesn't like looking at his knee, not even when he washes it. He usually keeps it covered with a brace and hasn't looked at it properly—even going as far as closing his eyes whenever he treated it—since his surgery at the beginning of second year left a scar, unnoticeable to others but glaringly obvious to Tooru. Some people might think of it as a reminder not to go too far again; but to him, it only serves as a reminder of his own failures, of how he was dumb enough to let it get to that point in the first place.

Iwaizumi is giving him that look that says he's this close to nagging Tooru with a long-winded sermon about being an idiot. Not really in the mood to be told off like a little kid just a few feet away from his team, Tooru complies and carefully peels back the brace, showing—

Tooru sucks in a sharp breath.

Wrapped around his knee is a beautiful flowerbed, consisting mainly of white roses and forget-me-nots. The flowers mould around his knee, with a dense cluster over his surgical scar. 

Iwaizumi cradles Tooru's knee in his hands as he inspects it for any injuries. Meanwhile, Tooru racks his brain, trying to remember what flowers used to be there or if there were any there to begin with; but _he can't remember_ because he's always put his damned knee out of his mind.

But _Iwaizumi_, Iwaizumi doesn't look any bit surprised, doesn't even fucking pause at the sight of the cluster of flowers. His fingers immediately go for the underside of Tooru's scar where Tooru used to complain about pain the most, and dammit, Tooru himself had a bit of a difficult time finding the scar underneath the flowers; but Iwaizumi's fingers immediately fly towards it, like he knew every cluster well enough to navigate his way through the white petals with ease.

"Iwa-chan..." Tooru's voice comes out shaky. His mind has reached a theory he doesn't know what to do with. 

"Not right now, Oikawa." Iwaizumi's voice is firm, and the way he says it clues Tooru in immediately: these flowers are Iwaizumi's, and Iwaizumi knows it. 

Tooru thinks back to every time Iwaizumi has helped him with his knee, recalls how Iwaizumi would ghost his fingers gently across as he wraps it after putting ointment on for Tooru. He imagines Iwaizumi quietly watching his own fingers trail along Tooru's knee and leave blooms in their wake, a testament of his devotion and love tattooed onto Tooru's skin.

The forget-me-nots almost _dance_ underneath Iwaizumi's touch, and Tooru snaps. 

"_Forget-me-nots?_ Really? You _idiot!_" He's crying now–fat, ugly tears slip out of his eyes as his face crumples; who gives a damn about his team just being on the other side of the door, or about the other two occupants of the clinic. He jabs a finger into Iwaizumi's chest, digging into the skin through the fabric of Iwaizumi's shirt, directly on top of where the red camellias are. "How the hell could I ever forget you, huh!?"

He sees the moment it clicks in Iwaizumi's head. Iwaizumi's hand reaches for his own chest, his fingers getting tangled in Tooru's. 

"This... This is _you?" _

"What, do you know anyone else who could possibly be so desperately in love with your ass and not be able to do anything about it?"

"I thought you hated me." He admits quietly. "For the longest time— After what I said, I wouldn't be surprised."

"We both said stupid things, Iwa-chan." He replies equally softly. Iwaizumi snorts.

"I thought the 'Great Oikawa-sama' never makes mistakes?"

Tooru's chest expands, making him feel like he could breathe easier. "Lucky you then, to be able to see the Great Oikawa-sama at his—"

"Stop talking shit or I'll smack you."

"Rude!"

Later—much later, when the practice match wraps up and Tooru chooses to stay even as the rest of his team head back to Tokyo—Iwaizumi brings him to his dorm. They talk about the insecurities they both faced at the end of high school, what Tooru's training was like, how Iwaizumi found purpose helping out at the gym's clinic. 

At some point during the night, face to face on the bed, Hajime's fingers find Tooru's, tangles and untagles, trails lightly until he's tracing his flowers on Tooru's knee. He asks if it still hurts. Tooru's own palm lands on his flowers on Hajime's chest, bare from when he asked Hajime to take off his shirt so Tooru's could see them, and says it feels better.

•

Hajime carried the _kuroyuri_ and the guilt that came with it for almost 2 years. They all disappear that night. 

All throughout, the red camellias never lost any of their luster, have never once dulled since they first bloomed on Hajime's skin.

**Author's Note:**

> It wasn't mentioned but Oikawa has a small daffodil hidden behind his ear that he doesn't know about because he can't see it. Iwaizumi is the only one who knows that it's from Kageyama.
> 
> -
> 
> Flower meanings:  
White rose - innocence, devotion  
Pink carnation - familial love  
Yellow chrysanthemum - imperial  
Pansy - "thinking of you"  
Violet - small love, sincerity  
Cactus - lust  
Red camellia - in love  
Yellow camellia - longing  
Daffodil - respect  
Bluebell - gratitude  
Peony - bravery  
Orange lily - hatred  
Zinnia - loyalty  
Primrose - desperate  
Kuroyuri - love, curse  
Forget-me-not - true love (lmao)


End file.
